Cyffordd Dyfi

They may be going to add other stretches too! Does this mean I’ll get to spend retirement ambling through Newtown and Welshpool and – joy of joys – stand on the platform at
Dovey Junction and wait for the connection to Barmouth?

The one thing about the railways of rural Wales I remember from college days was that they always arranged for the trains to go particularly slowly through the most scenic parts. Great for geography students but also for the would-be romantic poet among us!

Dash it! I’ve just realised the snag – I don’t live in Wales any more.

Conwy Valley Railway

One thing about growing older to look forward to is the possibility of travelling completely free on those out of the way stretches of railway that go through parts of the British countryside that are vanishing from memory.

I spent several holidays during growing up, accompanying my Dad round the goods yards and sidings along the banks of the River Conwy estuary, taking photos not of the engines and wagons (though I still have a few of those) but of the details of points and signal gantries, the inside of engine sheds and turntables and buffers.

The grand scheme of my youth was to complete a complex layout in Hornby 00 gauge of the Conwy Valley, featuring Glanconway and Deganwy stations, the piece de resistance being the town and castle. The question was where. Firstly it was going to be in the attic but then into the garden; we got as far as building the shed and the first 8 by 4 section which would eventually lead to Llandudno Junction. Then we took up golf.

Now at least the dream lives on through the prospect of riding endlessly around those lines I never got to model in 00 – all thanks to the Welsh assembly. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/6180746.stm

Around Alnwick

Last month we visited Northumberland and paid a first visit to the Alnwick Garden ...



... here are some images from our day there.

It was October so not much in blossom, but the crab apple trees were pretty impressive!

This Blogging Business

It's like DIY really, this blogging thingy.

Once I get started I can build a shed, tile the whole house, (well that's an exaggeration but I think I'm allowed poetic licence here) knock down the air-raid shelter to build a rockery, demolish the rockery and put in a fish-pond, move an electric plug, mend the back gate, lay a laminate floor ...


... sorry that last bit got a bit out of hand, but the point is, it takes me years to get round to this stuff, but if someone else comes round to my house and cuts a couple of tiles, bashes a hole in one of the walls, buys me some bricks for my birthday (HUMM!!) or kicks over the old shed, well, spurred into action and I can do it.

So the biggest problem with blogging is what I'm going to call myself that's not going to be too embarrassing and I'll regret it in two weeks' time, and what to call the Blog!

So for those who didn't know me back in 1964, and therefore don't have a clue who the Sploot family were, well, it's just a name.

But they do exist (somewhere in my imagination, along with Algy Jolly and the Mucklethwaite Jugglers, the Penguin who wanted to sail round the world, Bert Lacey and his bi-plane, and Jampot Joe.)

However I'm not sure how often any of them will appear in this Blog since it is meant for you - well more of a means for me to talk about the things that I think about, the things that happen or may have happened, and just sometimes, the things that really matter...

To me...

Or not to me?

That is the question!!!

Hey, well, not a bad start?